
This note to John Hilton is from Maynard Dixon. "Dear John, Be sensitive in perception, circumspect in approach, clear in color, definite in form -- and remember always, it is not the last stroke but every stroke that counts. Yours, M.D." ( Painters of the Desert, Ed Ainsworth, 1960.)
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But John's life cannot be defined by his painting alone. He was a man of inquisitive adventure.
Soon after Pearl Harbor, John noticed a few Army officers in a desert restaurant and introduced himself. After pleasantries were shared, the officers asked John's advice as to where to locate a training base for General Patton and his tanks. John circled what he thought to be an appropriate spot on the map and soon John found himself invited as a member of a reconnaissance mission into the desert with Patton himself. On one trip into the nearby Arizona desert, the General chose a certain campsite near two sets of cottonwood trees. John told the General that sidwinders would be passing from one group of trees to the other during the night, but the General being the General stood his ground. Later that night, "old Blood and Guts" found himself drawing one of his pearl handled revolvers and shooting an unwelcomed sidewinder drawn by the light of their campfire
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After Patton's Army went to North Africa, John missed his friend the General, but found his own way to help in the fight. He discovered and mined a super secret substance, a rare form of a common crystal called "optical" calcite, used in making highly accurate sights for the defensive guns on allied bombers. The sights sharpened the targeting accuracy of these guns used to shoot enemy fighters, and raised the survival rate of allied bombing patrol missions. Consequently, less missions had to be flown through hostile air space, saving airmen's lives. If John had been a better businessman, optical calcite, could have made him rich, but he believed himself part of the greater war effort, and refused to ask the army for more money.
After the war, while John was showing his paintings in Palm Springs, General Eisenhower came by, touched one of the paintings and left a fingerprint. Ike apologized, but John was most forgiving, commenting that the General's fingerprint raised the price of the painting. Ike painted with Hilton on several occasions, and invited John to his innauguration in January of 1953. John presented the President a painting, Twentynine Palms Oasis, and the new President proudly hung it in the Oval Office. Today the painting hangs resides at the Eisenhower Hospital in Palm Desert, California.
There is much more to tell of Hilton - how he used to burn his less than impressive paintings on New Year's Eve in a revel with other eccentric desert dwellers, leaving bonfire ashes and empty tequila bottles on the desert floor. John believed one had to let go of his or her mediocrities in order to strive for greater work. He believed this was far better than making unrealizable New Year's resolutions.
John held a special love for the Mexican Sonoran Desert and a magical old Spanish town called Alamos where John and his family purchased a summer home. In the surrounding valleys and mountains, he collected rare and often uncatalogued plant and animal species for northern universities.
Can you imagine the steady hands of this gifted painter riding a horse, reins in one hand while carrying a newly captured gila monster in the other? That tale, along with other observations and stories are told in John's skilled writing style, sophisticated composition with with simple and plain spoken strokes, much like his paintings. Sonora Sketchbook is a great read.
And John's creative output wasn't limited to painting or writing. He also played a little guitar and liked to sing. He made a record album with his baritone voice booming out ballads, Mexican folk tunes, and Indian chants. He even sang a tune at the funeral of a friend, Death Valley Scotty, which can be found on John's record album or by clicking the album cover below.
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Taking a break at the
calcite mine during WW II. |

John presents
Twentynine Palms Oasis
for Ike's Oval Office, Jan 1957 |

Click and listen to John
introduce and perform
a song he had sang
at the graveside of his friend,
the legendary "Death Valley Scotty" |
Death Valley was one of John's favorite spots and the locale of some of his paintings. One of these paintings resides behind the visitor's desk of the Death Valley Visitor's Center in Furnace Creek, alongside a painting by his daughter, Kathi Hilton.
Unpublished in any of the books or magazine articles by or about Hilton is a story shared by Kathi Hilton. Famed aviator and industrialist Howard Hughes was a friend of John, and flew in to see him, landing his plane on the highway in front of Hilton's gem shop. On one occasion, Hughes brought fresh Maine lobster, providing it for little Kathi's birthday party. To this day, lobster remains one of Kathi's favorite dishes.
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Hilton bent but never really abandoned his parent's hope for him to follow in their footsteps to become a missionary. The cover art on John's record album is a desert mountain painting entitled, "The Power and the Glory." On the back of his record album, he quotes his father who said of one of John's paintings, "Son, that is a sermon in paint."
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Sources: Discussions with John W. Hilton's daughter, artist Kathi Hilton. The Man Who Captured Sunshine, by Katherine Ainsworth, 1978; Sonora Sketch Book, by John W. Hilton, 1947; Hilton Sings, Record album released under his own label; Photos, from The Man Who Captured Sunshine, by Katherine Ainsworth and cover art for John Hilton's record album, Hilton Sings.
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